The Red Dress Party, In Fragments

The Red Dress Party is one of those events that requires some balls to attend. But unlike the Naked Bike Ride, for example, the fear isn’t that your co-workers will catch photos of your dangly bits. Instead, they’ll see you in a dress (of course, only a problem if you’re a guy).

True, gay guys love drag. But the ones who don’t are often more apprehensive to try it because they know everyone expects them to love it. It’s as if you can imagine Bill from the next cubicle seeing party photos on Monday and poking his head up to say, “I knew you were gay, but not that gay!”

In addition to the party being a chance for everyone to try drag, it’s also essentially Portland’s gay prom—the event of the season. So those who don’t muster the will to attend are often left wondering what they missed. “How was the music? Can I see you in your dress? Did Kevin fall in his heels?”

So for all of you who couldn’t make it, here’s a taste of Red Dress debauchery (notated by Siri since my dress had no place for a pen and paper):

10:06 pm Arriving fashionably late after pregaming/prefunking in Northwest Portland. People took double takes on the street, but a group of guys in dresses is pretty low on the list of odd things you see in this town.

10:12 pm Short line at the entrance. Welcoming committee includes two strangers who kiss me. Then again, they were in drag, so I might know them.

10:13 pm On to the drink line! Tickets ($50-$150) include unlimited drinks, the money going to Morrison Child & Family Services and Quest Center for Integrative Health.

10:36 pm So, the drink line is long.

10:40 pm “It feels like we’re in Chicago right now,” someone says of the venue. We’re mostly outdoors by the AudioCinema building, pretty much under the Hawthorne Bridge in the Central Eastside Industrial District. I’m not sure what’s “Chicago” about that, but it definitely feels like we’re not in Portland. Also, the weather. If we have to be outside in dresses, thank god it’s 70 degrees.